This attack is quite indiscriminate. There are already videos circulating of random people being collateral damage.
Israel is losing the support of people more and more, and all that due to the crusade of Netanyahu to stay in power and to not be imprisoned for his former crimes.
Despicable. So much human suffering and for what ?
Easy. When it is you or your allies committing an act, it is war and collateral damage. When it is someone else, it is terrorism.
It is often a difficult topic to discuss because both sides tend to be in the wrong. It ends up being asymmetrical warfare. The stronger side accuses the weaker of hiding behind civilians while the weaker side accuses the stronger of human rights violations.
As sad as this case is, I find it pretty interesting since it is clearly an extrajudicial act of violence carried out in a foreign land. The west will likely celebrate this, but I personally find this much worse than the Indian assassination that took place in Canada "recently" and didn't have significant collateral damage, yet the west was up in arms about.
Is the target the relevant piece or is it actual impact? If you have a single military target who is known to use X brand phone, is it war to kill 5,000 people to get this one target? Is it not instilling terror on the people who use those devices?
It is this rationalization that enables powers to bomb civilians and ethnic groups under the guise of targeting military targets who stand no chance if they segregate themselves from the populace due to the power dynamics. And then the cycle only continues as each side adds fuel to the fire.
The actually impact of every war since (a very long time) are that more civilians are killed and harmed than military personal. Looking at the statistics produced by the US military on the iraq war, civilian deaths was 3x of enemy combatants. UN has estimated that globally, modern wars has an 10:1 ration of civilian deaths to military combatants.
Looking at it from that perspective there is no line between war and terrorism. All wars are terrorism.
> targeting military targets who stand no chance if they segregate themselves from the populace due to the power dynamics
This is flawed rational. If you can't find any parking lot you keep driving, it doesn't allow you to double park and block someone else's car. If you are too weak to maintain your posture at war you shouldn't fight it on the backs of civilians. Your inability to execute your wishes legitimately doesn't provide you with any right to act illegitimately and inflict the cost and pain on others.
> If you can't find any parking lot you keep driving, it doesn't allow you to double park and block someone else's car. If you are too weak to maintain your posture at war you should't fight it on the backs of civilians.
That cuts both ways. Just like hamas should not hide amongst civilians, if Israel is too weak to go into Gaza to arrest hamas, it has no excuse to act illegitimately and bomb civilians.
It's terrible, heart breaking. But that's the outcome of very slow army attacks, with evacuations, humanitarian aid and efforts to minimize civilians casualties, not maximizing it.
The army could have burn down the entire strip from the air and leave no person or stone there, in five minutes. That's what I meant by burning down the entire strip. If Hamas had the power to do the same to Israel they would gladly do so, as is evident from the way they use their power and resources.
Saying that it's 'cutting both ways' is evil statement. One side gladly ignores the lives and suffering of it's own people, while the other pay with the lives of soldiers in an effort to minimize the death toll of the same people.
Try a different approach than engaging in war/apartheid. The practice of the IDF "mowing the grass" by harming civilians has been long established and commented on. Certain Israeli politicians also empowered Hamas, in order to divide and discredit the Palestinians, so that they would not be in a suitable position to negotiate an end to the conflict. Practices like that do not produce peace. I suggest Israel do its best to look at its role in this conflict (and not just Hamas's) and then act in good faith to bring about peace, so that there are no more terrorist attacks like Oct. 7.
Oct 7 happened and you're suggesting a different approach than a war, i.e. diplomatic solutions? That's too naive—not even the most pacifist country would do that.
And let's not pretend that no diplomatic solutions have been proposed, all of which were rejected. They will only accept it if they own every inch of the land and Israel is obliterated (their own word).
> Oct 7 happened and you're suggesting a different approach than a war, i.e. diplomatic solutions? That's too naive
The actions that led up to Oct. 7 long predate it. The seeds of this have been sown every year that the IDF "mowed the grass" and every time they tried to disrupt the PLO from negotiating a peace. Remember, an Israeli prime minister was assassinated for seeking and negotiating peace- not by the Palestinians but by a radical Israeli, whose politics are aligned with the current prime minister. This current prime minister has used his long time in office to disrupt and prevent any peace from occurring.
The disappointing logic there is the idea that historical conflict of any kind, anywhere on Earth, could possibly "seed" an atrocity like Oct 7. The sheer ferocity, scale and cruelty of 3,000 terrorists storming across the border to gleefully slaughter and capture civilians young and old, is somehow reduced to "oh well, they had it coming"... "oh well, the seeds were sown"?
In my view, that is a very dark and troubling position. I will never in my lifetime form the view that Oct 7 was anything other than crossing all lines. It was end-game stuff. Standing alone in measures of evil, it therefore needs dealing with on those terms. Civilised humanity should be uniting against that senseless barbarism including renewed focus on the deeper causes and future remedies for fanatical violent groups.
This may be why many of are divided: Those who believe Oct7 crossed all lines; and those who believe Oct7 was horrific but within "resistance" seed-sowing territory. We all want peace, but it amazes me the latter has any traction at all.
> The disappointing logic there is the idea that historical conflict of any kind, anywhere on Earth, could possibly "seed" an atrocity like Oct 7
If you don't recognize causes, then you will be baffled by effects. It has been clear to observers of the Middle East that the status quo that Netanyahu has created was violent and untenable. It gave the appearance of peace only because most people remained ignorant of the underlying brutality of the situation. If you think Oct. 7 was frightening, what do you think about the generations of children that have been killed and maimed by IDF soldiers and settlers? The terrorist invasion of Oct. 7 was terrible and unacceptable, but that does not make what Israel did before or after ok. The fact that you cannot recognize that Israel has also crossed all lines, means that you are incapable of being a part of the solution.
Israel has done many terrible things, no more than any other country who has engaged in war, nothing like crossing all lines, but pain was inflicted on innocent people, for sure. So what? October 7th isn't an inevitable or just counteraction. Jews have been mascaraed repeatedly for hundreds of years, including by Palestinians and other Arabs. Can you give an example where Jews retaliated by mass raping, butchering and burning alive their oppressors?
What you referring to are war crimes. Sadly this is part of most/all wars. Not justifying or trying to reduce the evilness of the actions, but this is something very different from October 7th or any other pogrom.
One are relatively small scale horrible events within an active full scale war, the other are sadistic attacks aimed at civilians, by crowd that is made of at least half civilians, outside of active war. One is a massacre, the other is a prolonged violence torture and mass raping.
I don't think Israelis are saints, and Israel could and should have acted better in many cases, both for moral reasons and for its own good. I believe a two states solution is the only just and sustainable option, and Israel's share in avoiding it is a terrible mistake. But October 7th wasn't action of people who see the two states solution as a desired state or a viable compromise.
> Not justifying or trying to reduce the evilness of the actions, but this is something very different from October 7th or any other pogrom.
Trying to treat the terrorist attack on Oct. 7 as unprecedented and unique is not only deeply ignorant but incredibly dangerous. It allows you to suspend all normal considerations of decency, which we have seen in the words of Israelis leaders (calling all Palestinians "human animals" and terrorists) and the actions of the IDF (war crimes, murdering civilians, throwing people off buildings, torturing, etc).
Please stop with your apologies for genocide and war crimes. Even Israeli scholars and Holocaust survivors recognize that what Israel is doing now is deeply wrong. Stop
I wish that October 7th was unprecedented. It is not the first pogrom Jews suffered. I'm not aware of a case in the history where Jews behaved like that. If it did occur,it is unexcusable, just like October 7th.
Let's put it in clear terms. I'm an Israeli, humanist and supports a two states solution.
You, on the other side, are terror justifying and, I guess, antisemite.
People usually use the word 'evil' to say something is not just bad, but to imply that there is a spiritual or supernatural significance to it. I understand that thinking in those terms can make it easier to deal with suffering, but you cannot know those things. I am not saying you should not keep searching for meaning (nor find strength in the belief in a kind and loving god if you do), but you should also remember that you cannot know god, nor know the mind of god, and believing that you do is fooling yourself- especially when it comes to discounting others pain in comparison to your own
That was not a conflict within a state. No one expected the US military to attack ISIS members within the US- that is clearly a police and judicial matter (and was thankfully treated as such).
Sorry but the failure of the state to contain the terrorist organization within it does not mean Israel should be expected to sit there and be attacked. Any country, when its citizens are attacked, have a right and a duty to respond.
Or maybe you are confused and think some how Israel has security control within Lebanon? Which is clearly not true.
That was a Marine barracks that was part of a "military peacekeeping operation". Granted, 128 non-military Americans were injured, but all of the dead people were military. The U.S. politicians labelled it terrorism.
>On November 5, 2009, a mass shooting took place at Fort Hood (now Fort Cavazos), near Killeen, Texas.[1] Nidal Hasan, a U.S. Army major and psychiatrist, fatally shot 13 people and injured more than 30 others.[2][3] It was the deadliest mass shooting on an American military base and the deadliest terrorist attack in the United States since the September 11 attacks until it was surpassed by the San Bernardino attack in 2015.[4]
Overall I agree. However, the difficulty that I see is when someone attacks a, sometimes nominally, military target in a situation or method where it will unreasonably injure or kill civilians. Or even when the military target is mostly an excuse to target civilians.
I think it can also get less clear when the target is an enemy's infrastructure, industry, or political infrastructure.
If an army unreasonably kills or injure civilians it will most probably be considered a war crime. Committing war crime is not necessarily better than being a terrorist, but it's different.
This military response was the opposite of indiscriminate. It was proportionate and targeted. It focussed as best as anyone ever could on the precise set of people who (hiding among their own civilians) have been launching hundreds of inaccurate rockets to kill Israeli civilians - for months.
It isn't the "best ever" as there was no guarantee the pagers were worn only by combatants. As of now, of the 9 dead, 1/3rd are definitely not: 2 children & 1 woman.
> set of people who (hiding among their own civilians)
These people should always wear military uniform and live in a separate neighborhood even when they're not on duty? What do you propose?
> have been launching hundreds of inaccurate rockets
>These people should always wear military uniform and live in a separate neighborhood
That is on the table, yes. Otherwise, while they mingle with civilians, it's clear that the civilians are in danger. If I'm one of them, and I'm intent on persuing this action, moving to military quarters is going to come to mind.
Imagine one of those pagers, hip height, at a shop queue or bus stop. Or you're on a bike in traffic next to one of them.
Everything about this sucks. It absolutely is indiscriminate. It's different than droning a guy at his house and accepting his wife as collateral damange. This is 3,000+ maiming explosive devices scattered all about with no way of mitigating the collateral damange.
I definitely agree that it's a problem that fighters are dispersed among the civilian population. However, requiring them to wear uniforms and live on a base seems like it would make it impossible for a smaller force or an insurgency to stand up to a more powerful enemy that is able to wipe out any obvious military target at will.
What's the alternative that doesn't give powerful nations more or less absolute power to push around weaker nations or people?
I don't think anyone, especially civilians, love the idea of militants hiding among the population. I don't know why they must in order to stand up to a more powerful adversary. Regardless, this isn't some kind of rule. It's more of a consideration for that individual, like "should I be hanging out at home with my family while I'm engaged in a dirty war with an adversary that is willing to strike my family to get me?"
1. It's really rather common for active duty military to segregate themselves in combat zones. One of the reasons is that there is mutual benefit in reducing the exposure of civilians.
2. There is no alternative to a powerful entity getting its way. We have the word power simply to describe that capability. It's not an annointed status.
Guerrilla warfare has been a reliable way for a less powerful entity to resist a more powerful one. However, it often requires the less powerful entity to hide within the general population; which results in the problem that we are seeing here.
That could very well be. However, you aren't really engaging with the point I'm making. If weaker powers aren't supposed to do guerrilla warfare, then what are they supposed to do? Just letting other groups roll over them isn't a viable option.
Likewise, if you target enemy personnel knowing that civilians are going to be the primary victims, you might be committing war crimes, even when it works.
"By the same token, it's totally fine for Hezbollah to raze Tel Aviv, because the IDF is based there, thus using civilians as human shields. And almost all Israelis become soldiers at age 18."
I agree, both sides act with extreme disregard for the other side. Blaming Israel ignores that Hamas and Hezbollah and Iran are constantly provoking them, blaming Hamas, Hezbollah, and Iran ignores that Israel is constantly provoking them. Going back and forth with "theyre terrorists" only leads to more terrorism.
I'm not advocating for anything. I'm just saying that it's unrealistic to expect people to just roll over for an enemy with greater conventional warfare capability.
Hiding among the civilian population is bad, but so is a situation where powerful states can oppress others without any check.
Personally, I'm not sure what a better alternative is. Which is why I asked my question.
Do we know approximately how many terrorists were killed and how many civilians were killed? Do we know what steps Israel took—if any—to prevent the target pagers from falling into civilian hands?
I'd say the pager bombing was as /surgical/ as one could possibly be.
A very sophisticated and targeted attack, putting tiny amounts of explosives in devices used by terrorist-linked individuals (ONLY Hezbollah were using the pagers because of their paranoia about Israeli monitoring of cellphones).
An example of an /indiscriminate/ attack is Hezbollah's firing of unguided rockets into Israel's civilian areas. In July, for example, a Hezbollah rocket killed 12 children playing football in the Golan Heights. THAT is indiscriminate killing.
Dropping kilotons of aviation bombs on a populated city is indiscriminate. This is nothing in comparison to that. Frankly I would even call this surgical.
There is no question that an enemy setting off thousands of small bombs in American supermarkets and homes, maiming unknown numbers of bystanders and killing children, would be designated an act of mass terrorism.
Anyone who claimed such mass terrorism is acceptable because it is not as bad as obliterating cities would be condemned as an apologist for terrorism.
They didn't indiscriminately set off thousands of bombs in supermarkets and homes. That's not at all an accurate description of what happened. That would be terrorism.
They gave a terrorist organization the ability to give its most important operatives a bomb to wear. And then they detonated that bomb. That's not terrorism. It's about as targeted of an attack as you can imagine. Blowing up terrorists is objectively a good thing.
They detonated the bombs in supermarkets and homes. It is 100% an accurate description of what happened.
If an enemy targeted members of American political parties that have sponsored terrorism and brutal dictatorships, detonating thousands of bombs in supermarkets and homes maiming nearby civilians and killing children, would you also call this “objectively a good thing?”
The bombs didn't even have enough force to kill 99.6% of people who had them attached physically to their waists. Semantically, that's a pretty big difference.
Not always. There was IRA, there was RAF, there was ETA. It's just in Middle East this problem is much bigger today, to the point where terrorist organisations can have whole countries under their control.
For powers that be, every rebellion is terrorism. This isn't new. Today, in matters concerning ME, even college kids are labelled terrorists without much thought: https://x.com/gobloid3/status/1836437489831055659
> these are both terror tactics, you're setting up a false dichotomy
Eh, there is utility to this attack beyond terror. Israel just simultaneously took out Hezbollah’s communications and definitively outed its senior members. Also, strategic bombing à la WWII wasn’t psychological—it was intended to wipe out the civilian population that worked in the war factories.
States engage in what you call terror tactics all the time, for legitimate military and illegitimate reasons. The clusterfuck with the Middle East is the sheer number of non-state actors. In Gaza, that’s complicated. But in Lebanon, it’s not—-the Lebanese state is widely recognised. Hezbollah is not a state, but it’s also not purely a political party.
> Eh, there is utility to this attack beyond terror
As there was in bombing civilian cities, which housed factory workers making war machines. You have put up another false dichotomy. Terror attacks do not need to be devoid of all non-terror utility to be considered terror attacks.
If, during America's war in Afghanistan, the Taliban had blown up pagers carried by American officers going about their lives in America it would be called terrorism. The nearby civilians injured in the blasts would be a key focus, not swept under the rug.
> If, during America's war in Afghanistan, the Taliban had blown up pagers carried by American officers going about their lives in America it would be called terrorism. The nearby civilians injured in the blasts would be a key focus, not swept under the rug.
Because they’re a non-state actor. (Hezbollah doesn’t follow and isn’t bound by the Geneva Conventions, either.) Even if it only hit American military personnel, we’d call it terrorism.
You’re labelling usual acts of war as terrorism. That punts us from the uncomfortable discussion of the human cost of war to the much more palatable one of semantics. This is war. War resembles terrorism because they’re both violent and brutal and largely indiscriminate. If this is terrorism, then we’re essentially saying any warfare is terrorism. If that is the case, then states have a legitimate right to terrorism. Not sure that’s where we want to end up.
> If this is terrorism, then we’re essentially saying any warfare is terrorism.
terrorism is primarily violence targeted at civilians, while legitimate acts of war targets military personnel (but could have civilians as collateral).
In this particular case, the pagers are targeted at non-civilian personnel, but has some civilian casualties.
Hezbollah rocket attacks, on the other hand, seems to be targeting civilians first, and military personels second (if they are accurate enough for such).
> terrorism is primarily violence targeted at civilians, while legitimate acts of war targets military personnel
States targeting civilians are a war crime. Not terrorism. The hijacking of Flight 77 was still terrorism despite targeting the Pentagon.
> the pagers are targeted at non-civilian personnel, but has some civilian casualties
That is war. That is collateral damage. Marking every military action with civilian casualties terrorism simply normalises terrorism as a legitimate war tactic.
I want to note that you are not wrong. There are many definitions of terrorism [1]. I’m just pushing back on this usage because it looks like the first step to normalising terrorism as something every power that has ever gone to war has done.
The Taliban was/is not a "non-state actor", they are and were the government of Afghanistan. And whether or not they were that has no bearing on whether or not a tactic is terrorism.
What do you mean? You fire out the "detonate" command on the frequency used by Hezbollah - only pagers connected to that network blow.
It's statistically probable you'll overwhelmingly damage terrorists. Sadly collateral damage is inevitable in war, and this is far more precise than even a laser guided bomb.
You're shopping for groceries. someone is standing next to you. Their pager explodes and you are severely injured. You never had anything to do with this war.
Still think it's surgical? By that definition 9/11 was surgical as well, after all they only targeted two towers and just a few people who happened to be there got hurt.
The US could just drop nukes on any country they have a trade dispute with. They don't, because that is insane and disproportionate and they have the capability to do better than that.
What Israel did here is something you would expect from a terrorist organization.
In comparison to bombing to smithereens the entire block, and having hundreds/thousands of people die under the rubble, some of them over the course of days - yes.
Do you know that 100 is more than 1? Some people get confused by simple arithmetic.
Exactly this. It's interesting how I haven't been able to find any single media portraying this as a possible act of terror while they have been quite critical of conduct in Gaza. I hope this changes as there really needs to be a reckoning with the idea of bombs randomly triggered anywhere, maybe hospitals, schools, theaters.
It's downvoted because it's the definition of proportional.
3g of explosives personally handed to the most senior leadership of your enemy and with enough explosive force that 98% of people who had them attached to their person survived is the very definition of restrained and targeted. Certainly not "indiscriminate".
Stuffing explosives into civilian appliances is the definition of indiscriminate.
If doing this isn't already banned by the Geneva Conventions, it is only because it wasn't practical to do. But then again, very little that has happened in this region during the last 80 years has been following any international law.
hardly, pagers might be accessible by the population, but hand delivered pagers distributed by a terror organisation are not exactly the same.
Panasonic Toughbooks are technically available to the civilian population, but booby trapping a shipment of them that would be delivered to the US military would be a pretty sophisticated military strike. Hardly indiscriminite even if people took them home.
Are you seriously suggesting that you would give away a pager, handed to you by your operator so that he can send you messages, a one-way legacy communication device selected as as an alternative for standard common cellphone specifically to avoid the risk of you being tracked by an enemy?
Not a bot. Just not wishing to connect my x years old user with anything related to politics. This is my only other account and that is within the site guidelines.
I'm an Israeli. So some of my views are aligned with Israel's official views. I would estimate the percentage of the alignment of my views with the current government at a single digit number. I have a negative, visceral reaction to Bibi, and can't stand hearing him even if I want to. I think Israel under the current government is doing almost every mistake possible, and takes the wrong decisions again and again, most probably due to Bibi's criminal issues and corrupted character.
Not all organizations work as the US military. Or even as a US company.
I know nothing about Hezbollah, but there's a widespread opinion on HN that any equipment you get from "work" can absolutely only be used by yourself in said work environment. That's really not the case in all cultures, everywhere.
At my previous job, management clearly told us that we could use computers & printers for any personal activity, including paid side jobs, as long as we didn't compete with the company and didn't go completely overboard with the printers (personal judgement).
Not every organization is hostile to its employees/members.
I'm guessing Hezbollah is not comparable to the US military in many respects, and assumptions that hold true for the US military may not hold true for any other military or paramilitary group.
That said, I don't have particularly strong opinions about this attack, and I certainly do not support Hezbollah in any way. But this "it works like this here, therefore it works like this everywhere" mentality is a hindrance to understanding the situation - any situation.
If you're giving your personal communication devices away, given that it's used to summon you personally...
... honestly?
I have no words, that's fucking stupid.
It's not like it's a toy, or it can play games, or that it can be used reach out to a parent/guardian if a child is lost.
It's a pager, a receive only communication tool. An outmoded one by far, and given to you by your terrorist organisation to intentionally evade Israeli detection.
If you're giving it to your children, not only are you basically being negligent in your duties, you're also giving away something that has less utility than the device you used to use and likely have on standby.
Perhaps. Still, in any pool of 3000 people it's fairly reasonable to assume that one or two (or ~2950) are "fucking stupid". Because people, as a rule, are.
If I'd let my prejudice run loose, I'd even argue that militant religious groups have an above average quota of "fucking stupid" people, so odds are indeed fairly good that some of these devices would make it into the hands of someone other than the original owner.
Some would argue that "being related to someone who is fucking stupid" is not a capital offence.
Alright, let's take this in the context in which it's been given to us then.
-> Your task is to, with as much accuracy as possible and with the minimum loss of civilian lives as possible, target a hostile force that lives within the population and does not identify themselves. They live outside of your borders.
-> If even a single non-combatant is lost, you are a monster.
-> In the mean time, every month that passes, hundreds of rockets rain down indiscriminate destruction upon your country, an action that has cost the lives of 12 children already.
Why are you asking me? I'm not even arguing that the attack was wrong.
I just challenged your - IMO incorrect - suggestion that it's reasonable to assume that no devices would spread to anyone other than the original owner.
If there's such a thing as acceptable collateral damage, the attack may still be reasonable. I'm even leaning towards the opinion that it is.
It's possible to consider the downsides of something without being opposed to it.
> It's downvoted because it's the definition of proportional.
Two wrongs don't make a right... are we really at that level of brain activity on HN of all places ? this is schoolyard level
You can have proportional terrorism, proportional war crimes, proportional crimes against humanity. Proportionality doesn't tell you much, it certainly doesn't tell you anything about it being indiscriminate or not
Also feel free to read the actual texts defining these things, detonating explosives in supermarkets is indiscriminate by nature, there is just no way around it if you're in good faith : https://ihl-databases.icrc.org/en/customary-ihl/v1/rule12
Both sides are clearly operating out of the boundaries we defined for conventional wars, is it really that hard to accept ? They're not even trying to hide it really... such a strange allergic reaction to these basic facts
Proportionality is at the center of defining a war crime.
"The principle of proportionality (Article 51(5) (b) API) states that even if there is a clear military target it is not possible to attack it if the expected harm to civilians, or civilian property, is excessive in relation to the expected military advantage."
So, the case that Israel has to make here is that the expected millitary advantage from the operation exceeds the collateral damage. The fact that civilians died doesn't automatically make it a war crime from an international law point of view.
Appeal to not be emotional is even harder to take seriously when Hezbollah rockets killed 12 children and Israel has killed 10,000 children this year alone.
You’ve put me in a bad position, because by telling you you’re wrong you will interpret it as if its reasonable.
First, we’re talking about Lebanon and its population, lets not muddy the waters further by suggesting that Hamas and Gaza are part of that conflict right now. But if we did, as far as I can make out, for the entire duration of the war since 10/7 there has been a total of 7,500 children identified as being killed. Sadly that number is not backed up by any independent source and unfortunately Hamas has been known to inflate these numbers.
Nonetheless, it is a tragedy.
An entirely unrelated tragedy to the 12:1 child murder ratio of Hezbollah vs IDF this year, and under entirely different circumstances.
I would prefer more interventions in Gaza to mirror this one in its precision and lack of civilian casualties.
I’m certain that you would prefer no intervention happen at all, which is where we will have to fundamentally disagree and part ways.
> as far as I can make out ... there has been a total of 7,500 children killed
I said 10,000 for this year, which is lower than the amount coming from Gaza. You low balled it much further. Hamas might be accused for inflating numbers, but Israeli apologists are actively deflating that number. Regardless, the numbers are staggering.
> I'm certain that you would prefer no intervention ...
Firstly, you don't know me but have immediately filled in who you believe I am based on your expectations. You should reflect on that (and how much you are creating your own world), because those prejudices are exactly what motivate the hate that drives these conflicts.
I would like to see intervention in Gaza. Number one, would be to stop the indiscriminate bombing of children. Number two, would be to provide relief to all of the people who have lost their homes and livelihood, who have been maimed and are starving. Number three, would be to resolve the displacement of the Palestinians in a just manner. Number four, would be judicial proceedings against anyone (Palestinian or Israeli) who committed war crimes.
Israel cannot be bombing civilians. It is a war crime. Gaza is not a sovereign state, but a displaced people living in Israel. If Israel is too weak to go in and arrest criminals who commit heinous crimes, then it needs to contend with the problem and take a different approach to how it deals with the Palestinian people.
I can find literally no source for 10.000+ outside of the UN "estimating" it, the nearest I could find was 7.500 and that's not verified (and old). I'm not trying to downplay anything and I resent the implicaiton.
I'm perfectly content holding Israel to account for their numerous crimes, but that becomes extremely difficult to do when you have literal terrorists doing everything they can to make things as bloody and cantankerous as humanly possible to cast shadows at Israel.
Bombing civilians is not technically a war crime in of itself, people like to use the word war crime without actually fucking reading what are war crimes, such as not identifying yourself as military, hiding in the population, using medical buildings as cover and so forth.
Israeli's settling the west-bank and blockading aid under the guise of "the more material they have, the more they will use against us" is condemdable; but when 5,000 rockets suddenly launch from Gaza and a ground force invasion kills over a thousand people -- people reasonably start to think that Israel has a point, and all my criticisms against Israel suddenly start to look very impotent.
Where I get annoyed is that people have decided that terrorists are good, actually, despite clearly throwing gay people off of roofs and engaging in what are actual war crimes.
> I can find literally no source for 10.000+ outside of the UN "estimating" it, the nearest I could find was 7.500 and that's not verified (and old). I'm not trying to downplay anything and I resent the implication.
You resent the implication, but you also did not appear to do any research to support your view.
> Bombing civilians is not technically a war crime in of itself, people like to use the word war crime without actually fucking reading what are war crimes, such as not identifying yourself as military, hiding in the population, using medical buildings as cover and so forth.
> Israeli's settling the west-bank and blockading aid under the guise of "the more material they have, the more they will use against us" is condemdable
The settlement of the West Bank is in direct violation of international law (article 49 of the Geneva Convention) and is a war crime in itself.
> Where I get annoyed is that people have decided that terrorists are good, actually, despite clearly throwing gay people off of roofs and engaging in what are actual war crimes.
I don't know who thinks "terrorists are good". To me, that sounds like a strawman to avoid the realization that what Israel is doing is deeply wrong.
Even Israeli scholars on genocide like Omer Bartov (a former IDF officer) state "it was no longer possible to deny that Israel was engaged in systematic war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocidal actions."
Israel is engaged in war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide. That is painful to acknowledge, but in some ways is not surprising. The victim becoming the victimizer is a human story older than the Bible. The Jewish refugees from WWII underwent terrible horrors and were deeply traumatized. It is not surprising that many of them became radicalized and deeply angry. We have seen the same thing happening to the Palestinians, as well as any other people that is traumatized.
You're almost there buddy... people criticising israel here are also criticising hezbollah for war crimes... you don't have to pick a side and close your eyes on their actions
Three grams of explosives in each device used by a hostile military organization.
I don't think it could possibly be more targeted. Literally just devices issued by Hezbollah themselves to their own members.
Maybe it wasn't perfect. That seems to be the bar you are setting.
But much closer to perfect than I would have imagined possible. And closer to perfect than I think most people would have imagined. Maybe that is aggravating to people ideologically set against literally anything they might do.
But far superior, and less disruptive to innocent people to tactics used elsewere by Israel. Far far more more targeted and less disruptive to innocent people than the tactics used by Hezbollah themselves.
Am I misinformed, or was 3,000? They are the most senior 3,000? When you send out 3,000 explosive into the general population, how do you mitigate the collateral damage? I truly don't know the answers here. I'm under the impression that they all detonated simultaneously, so I'm keen to infer that there was very little thought given to civilians unlucky enough to be in the vicinity.
Man. Blasting off fingers and genitals is really something...
All the information I have seen indicates that they were handed to Hezbollah and distributed by Hezbollah for the intent purpose of avoiding Israeli intelligence services.
With your analogy it would be like emptying the mag in the general direction of the car of the target, praying the target actually is in the car and praying there is no one else anywhere close to him.
Please help me understand then, because from what I can understand about the facts here:
1) It was delivered into the pockets of Senior Leadership of Hezbollah, with an incentive for those pagers not to be distributed elsewhere.
2) The explosive yield was very small, of an estimated 3000 pagers; 12 fatalities were recorded, making the death rate about 0.4%. One of which was a child, a relative of a Hezbollah leader. (this is an unjustifiable tragedy, but the only recorded civilian fatality).
3) There has never been, in the history of all warfare, such a surgically precise attack with such a low casualty rate of the civilian population - considering the attack happened at a singular time where it was not possible to get all of the members away from the civilian population at all.
I'm not sure I understand your reasoning, it's not indiscriminate if it's very targeted and very localised.
It's like something in a James Bond movie, or a cheesy riff on the genre like Kingsman.
You might not want to acknowledge it, but this is definitely a new era of warfare, and one that hopefully has benefits for everyone - reducing the reliance on global supply chains that harm the environment because labour is cheaper elsewhere. (it's a very thin silver lining, let me have it).
Don't be silly, 11 criminals dead and one bystander is well within limits of even a civilian police force, military ones are considered much more broad.
NATO sets the acceptable loss threshold at 4:1; for every 4 combatants killed, 1 civilian is considered acceptable.
Yes, this is callous, and cold, and awful, but emotion has no place here, we're talking about people on both sides who feel like they are fighting for their right to exist. This is quite literally war, and there will be casualties.
Truth be told, while I'm not giddy and children dying, I'm glad we're talking about so few civilian casualties despite causing so much damage to Hezbollah operatives and operations.
Don't be silly, 11 criminals dead and one bystander
You aren't even getting the military-civilian ratio for the first wave right. According to the Lebanese Health Ministry we have at least 6 civilians killed (including 4 healthcare workers and 2 children), so that's at most a 1:1 ratio, far less than the 4:1 rate that you cite as "acceptable". And this doesn't even touch on the vastly larger number of wounded (2,750 just for the first wave).
By all indications these devices were intended to maim even more so to kill -- and to do so a great scale. From Wikipedia:
At least 12 people were killed after the first wave of attacks,[73][1][74] and more than 2,750 were wounded.[6][7] Civilians were also killed,[11][14][15] including four healthcare workers[75] and two children.[76] It is not clear if only Hezbollah members were carrying the pagers.[20] Lebanese Health Minister Firass Abiad said the vast majority of those being treated in emergency rooms were in civilian clothing and their Hezbollah affiliation was unclear.[77] He added the casualties included elderly people as well as young children.
Interesting, it seems there's a conflict between what the Lebanese Health Ministry said, and what Hezbollah said (as of yesterday) -- and you're choosing to go with Hezbollah's numbers.
It does seem that the reports are still coming in, and are in the process of being evaluated and fact-checked. I chose to go by WP because in most cases at least attempts to reconcile between different sources, though it's far from 100 percent accurate about anything.
Hopefully we'll have better numbers within the coming week or so.
> To sum up, sabotage against the enemy is a lawful operation provided the legal rules for the choice of targets and the methods and means employed are respected.
Do you think they meant: booby trapping is _illegal_ unless it's to harm military personnel ? lol
"Rule 80. The use of booby-traps which are in any way attached to or associated with objects or persons entitled to special protection under international humanitarian law or with objects that are likely to attract civilians is prohibited."
Examples of protected objects are childrens toys or medical supplies bearing the insignia of the red cross; but if you want further reading: See, the military manuals of Belgium (ibid., § 32), France (ibid., § 39) and Germany (ibid., § 43) - hard to read without translations though.
Examples of protected persons include, of course, doctors who wear the red-cross insignia. However it's also a war-crime to wear this insignia and act in the interests of any power exclusively, or operate as a combatant. - so, owning military equipment that is given out by the high command of a terror organisation would immediately disqualify you, and if you survived the blast you would be facing a tribunal.
However, Booby-traps which are used in a way not prohibited by the current rule are still subject to the general rules on the conduct of hostilities, in particular the principle of distinction (see Rules 1 and 7- linked below) and the principle of proportionality (see Rule 14). In addition, the rule that all feasible precautions must be taken to avoid, and in any event to minimize, incidental loss of civilian life, injury to civilians and damage to civilian objects (see Rule 15) must also be respected.
But proportionality is in play if you do not fall below the NATO recommended 4:1 combatant:civilian ratio. Which it seems Israel didn't.
This attack is quite indiscriminate. There are already videos circulating of random people being collateral damage.
Israel is losing the support of people more and more, and all that due to the crusade of Netanyahu to stay in power and to not be imprisoned for his former crimes.
Despicable. So much human suffering and for what ?